The End Letters of מ נ צ פ ך
From Rabbi Shimshon of Ostropoli
שמות טו, יח ה' יִמְלֹךְ, לְעֹלָם וָעֶד.
18 HaShem shall reign for ever and ever
The Medrash (Yalkut Shimoni 253) says that when the Jews left Egypt they proclaimed “HaShem reigned. HaShem shall reign for all eternity.” But they did not say HaShem reigns. Had they also said the third item, then no nation in the world would have ever been able to have dominance over the Jews, and there would have been no more decrees of exile.
Rabbi Shimshon explains as follows:
When the Jews left When the Jews left Egypt, there was a lot that they had to counter. primarily the heavenly prosecutors, the governing angel of Egypt. demanding their recapture by the Egyptians in view of the fact that they were both idol worshippers and sinners (Zohar Temma 170b). Through the Jew's praises to HaShem and their songs of thanks. they slowly annulled the prosecuting angels that were vying for their ruin.
The Seforim teach that there are five doubled letters of the Alef Beis, כ מ נ פ צ , referred to as מנצפך (Shabbos I04a). represent the forces of prosecution and strict judgment. Their five letters mirror (in number) the five letters that form the name א-להים, which is the name of HaShem that represents strict judgment. The reason why these five final letter forms symbolize judgment is because these final letters are only found at the end of a word. Their function is to restrict; once they are added to the suffix of a word, no other letters can be added and the word cannot be changed. Restriction is the function of judgment and therefore these letters represent the side of strict judgment.
Looking at the setup of the letters מנצפך , the apparent problems stand out. Why are the letters arranged in their correct Alphabetic order? Instead of מנצפך they should be arranged כמנפץ.
The reason for this seemingly peculiar arrangement is to intentionally reflect the worlds found in the prayer:
מְלךְ לְעוֹלָם וָעֵד ה' מֶלֶךְ, ה' מָלַךְ, ה' י
The word מֶלֶךְ, reigns, has the numerical value of 90. So, does the word מָלַךְ, reigned. The word ימלך has the numerical value of 100.
Examining the formation of the letters מנצפך the same numbers appear, but only because they were intentionally arranged out of Alphabetic order.
מ נ 90 ה' מֶלֶך
צ 90 ה' מָלַך
פ ך 100 ה' יִמְלך
With this introduction, it is no possible to understand the Medrash.
The Jews had praised HaShem by proclaiming his sovereignty and said, “HaShem reigned. HaShem shall reign for all eternity.” By doing this action, they nullified the judgement and prosecution against them represented by the letters מנ פך since these combinations matched up. However, they still needed to mollify the judgement represented by צ which corresponds to ה' מָלַךְ which they did not say. Because of this, the Jews did not totally eradicate the heavenly prosecutors against them and thus, additional decrees followed with subsequent exiles.
